The News of the World championed Sara Payne's campaign to change the law so that parents have access to information about paedophiles living locally, after her eight-year-old daughter Sarah was abducted and murdered.

It was former editor Rebekah Brooks's decision to throw the paper's considerable editorial clout behind that campaign, and Payne and Brooks forged a close professional relationship as a result. For a time after Sarah's murder in July 2000, the paper was synonymous with its high-profile campaign to "name and shame" convicted sex offenders.

Brooks and Payne became close as a result. One industry source who knows Brooks well said the two women were "very good friends".

As a young editor of the News of the World who had taken over just a couple of months before Sarah's death, Brooks first came to public prominence because of the paper's high-profile "For Sarah" campaign. Modelled on "Megan's law" in the US, it called for parents to be allowed access to information about sex offenders in their areas. It emerged in 2002 that Sarah had been murdered by Roy Whiting, a convicted sex offender.

Sara Payne was often seen at Brooks's side as the two women called on the government to change the law and the paper organised a public campaign to force a change of policy. It also called for paedophiles sentenced to life imprisonment to remain in jail until they died. Payne was given an OBE in 2009 as a result of her work.

It was Brooks's first major campaign as a national newspaper editor – she had been made editor of the Sunday tabloid after serving as the Sun's deputy editor only months earlier – and it became arguably the most famous in the News of the World's long history, as well as its most controversial.

Brooks later wrote: "I took a chance and drove down to see Sarah's parents Mike and Sara. The press pack waiting outside were more than a little surprised when I turned up on the doorstep. Inexplicably Mike and Sara agreed to see me and the repercussions of that meeting started the Sarah's law campaign."

A petition supporting the changes was signed by more than 1 million News of the World readers.

After the government said it had no plans to change the law, the paper adopted a policy of "naming and shaming" known sex offenders, which led to paedophiles being attacked by members of the public.

Earlier this month, when the News of the World published its final edition, Payne wrote a column for the paper declaring that "the News of the World and more importantly the people there became my very good and trusted friends".

Key staff from the paper, including former managing editor Stuart Kuttner, attended the funerals of Sara Payne's parents.

Sara Payne and her husband Michael, who later separated, supported the News of the World's campaign to "out" paedophiles. She told the Police Federation in 2003 that: "Naming and Shaming carried on with mine and Michael's full support, and I have to say that the News of the World team rang us on a daily basis to see if we wanted to stop or halt, or if we wanted to withdraw our support."

Payne set up a child protection charity called Phoenix Survivors and continued to write regularly for the paper.

When Brooks appeared before the culture, media and sport select committee last week, she conceded she had used private investigators to locate convicted paedophiles. She continued to deny any knowledge that phone hacking was taking place at the paper.

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